By the Rev. J. Wilkinson. 341 
which she took care to be described in the Duke’s will, inherited 
all his land for her life, and every shilling absolutely. 
The Duke of Kingston wanting money to buy a wedding dress 
for his bride, was advised by his steward, local report says, to sell 
his outlying Monkton estate; which accordingly passed by a deed, 
March 1768, into the hands of the said steward, Samuel Shering of 
Whitemore, in the county of Nottingham, gent. There is a tradi- 
tion that the Duke, afterwards hunting in the neighbourhood, ad- 
mired the rich meadows, and the picturesque old house by the 
broad river bank; and, learning on enquiry that it had been very 
lately his own, observed that he never would again sell what he 
had never seen. On the death of the new purchaser, in 1780, 
Monkton passed to his brother and heir-at-law, John Shering of 
Nottingham, Esq., who devised the same in January 1800 to John 
Keddle, then of Fordington, afterwards of Hatchlands in Nether- 
bury, Dorset, Esq. On the death of John Keddle, in 1844, it 
passed to his eldest surviving brother and heir-at-law, Samuel 
Shering Keddle of the Elms, Beaminster, Dorset, M.D., the pre- 
sent owner.! 
(To be continued.) 
1 Hanging here, time out of mind, are portraits of Mary Queen of Scots and 
Earl Darnley. They seem to be copies, and as works of art are insignificant. 
But, considering the connection of the Seymours and Thynnes with Queen 
Elizabeth, it is not improbable that the originals were once here, and that these 
copies were substituted for them in the Duke of Kingston’s time. Both are in 
their ordinary attire, not in state costume. The expression of Mary’s face is 
very pensive, as well it might be during her life with Darnley. The beauty is 
touching, rather than striking. 
